Poland Seeks to Extradite 98-Year-Old Man from Minnesota for Nazi Massacre During WWII

Michael Karkok, a 98-year-old U.S. citizen suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, has been identified by Polish authorities as the Nazi unit commander who ordered his troops to “liquidate all the residents” of two Polish villages in the summer of 1944.

““You could hear machine-gun shots and grenade explosions,” recalled Stanislawa Lipska, a survivor from one of the villages, Chlaniow. “Shots could be heard inside the village and on the outskirts. They were making sure no one escaped.’

Vasyl Malazhenski, a soldier in the company, recounted that he “could see the dead bodies of the killed residents: men, women, children.’

For decades, the commander who ordered the atrocity remained unknown, his war crimes unpunished even as Nazis and their collaborators have been pursued around the world.”

Despite protests of innocence from Karkok’s family, Polish authorities seek his arrest and extradition for trial as a war criminal.